Where Nobody Dies (33 page)

She glanced at me as though I'd proposed an impromptu trip to the moon. I suspected that she was afraid to make the smallest concession, afraid she'd lose her nerve completely and sink into submission. “No,” she said curtly.

“Nilda”—the same coaxing voice—“she can't breathe. Look, move it an inch,
one inch”
—my voice grew intense with pleading and hope—“and it'll still be close enough to”—I broke off, not really interested in finishing the thought.

“You telling me what to do, bitch?” The challenge was pure skell, but I had the feeling Nilda'd taken the attitude out of mothballs. Her days as a Savage Macho Deb were a long time past now, and her aggressiveness sounded forced.

“I'm asking, Nilda,” I said quietly. “In fact, if you want me to, I'm begging.”

She moved the knife. I sighed with relief; Dawn, released ever so slightly from her prison, began to swallow convulsively. “Thank you,” I said to Nilda, who nodded with a curtness that I sense masked her own relief.

Art. He was my ace in the hole, my hope. I had to wrench my mind away from Dawn's tensed muscles and strained face and concentrate on Art and Nilda.

“As I was saying”—I tried for the casual tone—“was Art supposed to drop everything to run off with you to Costa Rica or wherever?” I added a taunting note: “How's his Spanish, Nilda? You think he'd have been thrilled to give up being a congressman to play Sydney Greenstreet in some tropical hole?”

“Art loves me.” Nilda tossed her head. “He'll go with me.” She said it confidently, but I didn't buy her assurance for a minute.

“Maybe he will and maybe he won't,” I countered, “but the point is, you couldn't be sure. That's why you killed Linda, isn't it? You weren't sure what Art would do once he found out he wasn't married to Aida Valentin.”

“Shut up,” Nilda said, her hand beginning to shake. The knife was still an inch away from Dawn's neck, so I pushed my luck—and hers.

“Maybe there's more to it than that,” I suggested. “Maybe that charming little story about innocent little Nilda corrupted by evil Nelson Rodriguez wasn't the whole truth, and maybe there are a few people still around and ready to testify who remember it differently.”

No answer, but the sullen set of Nilda's mouth told me I was making progress.

“Then again,” I went on, “who's to say Aida's death was an accident? It was pretty convenient for you—maybe you made sure she got some bad dope.”

“Shut up!” Nilda shook with rage, her voice a scream. She thrust the knife against Dawn's neck. Even now, I could see she had no real will to hurt, but Dawn jumped and a tiny dot of blood appeared on her white neck. Her huge eyes were a prayer.

“Hey,” I protested, “don't get carried away. After all, it's not what
I
think that counts. It's what Art thinks. And I wonder how he's going to feel if he walks in here and finds his beautiful wife holding a bloody knife in her hand with a dead kid on the floor.”

I could see at once that Dawn was horrified by my choice of words. I probably wouldn't have cared to have them videotaped for posterity myself. But Nilda got the point. The knife flew away from Dawn's throat. This time Nilda left a good three inches, and the knife shook perceptibly.

The phone shrilled. All three of us jumped, then Nilda cried, “Don't touch it!”

“It might be the cops,” I pointed out. Nilda's eyes grew wide. “What did you expect?” I asked her. “They've probably got the place cordoned off and surrounded by now. But they may have Art. Think about it.”

Nilda didn't have to think very hard. “Pick it up,” she ordered, “and bring it over to where I can hear every word.”

I obeyed. My legs were so rubbery, I had to grab onto a desk or two to carry me to the phone. I hoped Nilda didn't notice; my strategy depended on my being—or seeming to be—the one in control. I brought the phone to where Nilda sat, picked up the receiver, and held it between us.

“Cass?” Detective Button barked my name, but I could hear an undertone of concern that warmed me.

I looked at Nilda, intentionally reinforcing her need to seem in charge. Only after she nodded did I respond. “I'm here,” I said crisply.

“Congressman Lucenti's here,” Button said. “Shall I send him in?”

Nilda nodded. Behind her closed face, I felt a surge of hope. Art was coming; Art would make it all right.

I felt the same way, staking everything on Art's abiding love for the woman he'd married. The gamble was that I was staking Dawn's life on whatever would be left after Art Lucenti's illusions had been stripped away.

“Yes,” I told the phone, responding to Nilda's eager nod. “Send him right in.” I hung up the phone and tensed myself for the next round.

Art came in like gangbusters. His “What the hell is going on?” could be heard even before the door was open. As he swung it wide and strode into the room, he boomed, “First I get a message that my wife needs me. Then the cops tell me some cockamamie story about a hostage. What the—” His jaw fell open, and the words stopped when he saw the knife.

“My God,” he breathed, the take-charge masculinity evaporating like an April snow. “Aida?” The deep voice quavered, and a shadow of doubt crossed the handsome face.

Nilda didn't reply. She might have been a statue in her rigidity. It was as if his glance, his voice, could break her. He repeated the name, “Aida?” He ended on a high note of uncharacteristic uncertainty.

No answer. It was, I supposed, difficult to tell your husband that he'd been calling you by the wrong name for thirteen years.

“Shall I tell him?” I asked Nilda gently.

“I'm talking to my wife. Haven't you made enough trouble already?”

“Art, please,” Nilda begged. “Listen to her.”

Art reached her in two strides. Standing over her, he said forcefully, “If this is about that crap Todd Lessek showed me—”

He broke off as Nilda and I both shouted, “What?”

Art rounded on me. “That prick showed me Aida's criminal record. He had some fairy tale about Linda Ritchie digging it up, but I knew better. He wanted me to know where I stood with him.” I recalled the bitter cold day Lessek and I had stood on the Brooklyn Bridge and I'd watched Lessek crush Art Lucenti's imaginary balls. I was learning now that Art hadn't had the naïve faith in Lessek that the developer had thought.

“I told him what he could do with it then,” Art said, turning back toward his wife, “and I still mean it. Let it come out. Who cares? All that matters is, I'm proud of you and I don't care where you came from or what you did.”

It was a lovely speech. The only problem was that he wasn't talking to Aida Valentin. It was time somebody told him that, and it looked like it wasn't going to be Nilda. She shot me an agonized glance. I sympathized; Art's touching profession of support was about to be severely tested.

I didn't dare take my eyes off Nilda, but I said matter-of-factly, “She wants me to explain. It's a long story, and it'll be easier if you just listen, okay?”

I could hear an impatient huff, but I had his attention. “Aida had a friend in the South Bronx,” I began, “a friend named Nilda Vargas. Nilda started running with a gang and got herself in a lot of trouble. Wanted for murder, that kind of thing.”

“What's that got to do with my wife?” Art challenged. “You can't blame her for what her friends did.”

“This is going to take longer if you keep interrupting.” I sighed. “The point is, Nilda Vargas is supposed to be dead. The rest of the world thinks she died fifteen years ago. Only a few people know the truth—that Nilda is alive and that Aida Valentin is the one who died.”

Art's eyes widened, and he paled. He looked at Nilda with an expression of horror. “Then—” He choked on the words and started again. “You mean, my wife—”

I nodded. “Is really Nilda Vargas,” I finished. “And she's wanted for murder.”

Three women waited. I sensed a subtle realignment, subtle yet as dangerous as a shifting fault line. I was on Nilda's side. It was the two of us, with Dawn's silent, terrified presence between us, against Art Lucenti. We had to win him, had to keep him in the office, on Nilda's side, or it would all be over. If Art turned away, walked out the door, abandoned Nilda, then Dawn would die and Nilda would follow. She would have no further reason to live and no reason at all to spare Dawn. Yet underneath the fierce pose I sensed the truth: Nilda did not want to kill anyone. What she wanted was for Art to take the knife away and embrace her as he always had before. I hoped to God, for her sake as well as for Dawn's, that he could do it.

“My God,” Art said again. It was beginning to sound like a prayer. “Wasn't there a man?” he asked. “Nelson something?”

“Nelson Rodriguez,” I responded helpfully. “He was the real killer. A gang leader.”

Art nodded. “I remember the news stories.” His handsome face was settling back into its customary lines of command and complacency. I had the feeling he was engaging in the same lawyer-think I'd used before Nilda'd gone nuts and whipped out her knife. He was weighing the possibilities, picturing Nilda walking out of court a free woman, after winning a motion to dismiss in the interests of justice.

Part of me wanted to risk staying with the illusion. Let Art think the old charges were all Nilda had to worry about. What difference did it make as long as he got the knife away from her? But I knew the truth would have to come out. Nilda's tense pose, her manufactured defiance, showed me that Art hadn't passed the final test. She would not relinquish her weapon or her hostage until he did.

How to put it? Oh, by the way, your wife killed Linda Ritchie as well as all those other people. The difference was that the others were faceless, nameless, and could be blamed on Nelson Rodriguez. Linda had happened now, had been killed by the woman Art had known and loved for thirteen years, not by a phantom teenager in a gang jacket and a miniskirt.

“Linda found out,” I said baldly. “She was blackmailing Nilda.”

Art turned green. For a moment I thought he was going to throw up. “Oh, God,” he said again, then he faced his wife, who visibly trembled with anxiety.

“Why?” he asked, his voice choking. “Why couldn't you tell me? You know I'd have helped you if I'd known.”

That was just what Nilda Vargas Lucenti hadn't known, I thought, as I watched her face relax.

“Didn't you trust me?” he asked, bewildered.

Nilda looked down. Her eyes seemed fixed on the knife she held in her hand, but I doubted she really saw its gleaming edge. “You changed a lot, Art,” she replied softly. “I wasn't sure how much.”

Art's eyes narrowed. “What do you mean, I changed?”

“You were so idealistic,” she said, “when I first saw you in the office. You used to spend all day in court and then come back to the office, drop your files on the desk, and jump into a gypsy cab to go to a rent-strike meeting. I loved you for what you were doing to help people.” She took a breath and went on. “Then you started doing what Todd Lessek wanted instead of what you knew was right.”

“You never said anything,” Art protested.

“It was what you wanted,” she announced simply. “I didn't want to be the one to get in your way.”

I put my oar in. “It wasn't easy for her,” I pointed out, “being the wife of a well-known man and a fugitive from justice at the same time.”

I looked straight at Art Lucenti. The pain and betrayal that had filled his face were fading now. A sober sadness was taking its place. Slowly, with agonizing clarity, he was giving up the illusion that he and Nilda could walk out the door and resume something like their old life.

“She never tried to talk you out of it, did she?” I pressed. “She was there for you, Art—what are going to do for her?”

No answer. “She molded herself to you, to your world. The right clothes, the right people. For years she was what you wanted her to be. You never even bothered to find out who she really was, for God's sake. She sacrificed for you—what are you willing to sacrifice for her?”

Art gazed at his wife with naked longing. Then he turned toward the door, as if weighing his choices.

“Art.” I said the words I'd been hoping to avoid. “Nilda's a skell. By rights, her first, second, and third thoughts ought to be for herself alone. But she's
here
, not in Costa Rica or someplace, because she wants you by her side.”

Time stopped. Art looked long and hard at his wife. I hoped to God he was seeing the woman he loved as well as the tough gang kid, the disheveled hostage-taker, the knife-murderer. Finally, he sighed and reached out a hand. It trembled slightly, but it came right up to the shining blade. “Aida,” he said gently, “give me the knife.”

It glinted in her hand, but she made no move to lower it. Her eyes were fixed on his face, as if trying to sense a trick.

“I'll hire the best damned lawyer in town,” Art promised. “You won't go to jail if I have anything to say about it. A lot of people owe me a lot of favors, and I'll collect on all of them if I have to.”

Still no movement from Nilda. “It's your only chance,” I pleaded. “Think about it, Nilda. Art loves you in spite of what you did in the past. But what do you think he'll feel if he has to stand there and watch you cut a child's throat?”

Dawn flinched. The idea hadn't done a lot for me either. But the very brutality of the thought made Art wince and Nilda saw it. Very slowly, the knife blade began to lower, glinting in the fluorescent lighting. Down, down, down it came until it hung limply at her side.

Art took it from her unresisting fingers and gently laid it on a table. Then he reached out and stroked her hair. “I love you, babe,” he said softly, “in spite of everything.”